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Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://www.weizenbaum-library.de/handle/id/1111
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Item The Telegram COVID-19 Protest Dataset 2020-2022(2025-01-01) Heidi Schulze,; Kilian Buehling,; Maximilian Zehring,Telegram, known for its hybrid architecture combining features of instant messaging and social networking sites, offers various communication modes and a high degree of anonymity. This has made it a key platform for contentious political movements and extremist actors and the most important platform for COVID-19-related protest communication. This paper presents a novel, manually curated dataset, capturing the German-language COVID-19 protest mobilization on Telegram from 2020 to 2022. The dataset includes public messages from 715 broadcast channels and 229 public group chats N= 5,641,026 messages. Unlike other datasets, this collection was manually classified and processed, providing a detailed longitudinal overview of this movement and its network. Data were collected at multiple points during the observation period, minimizing data loss due to deletions and enhancing the historical value of the dataset. Additional variables, including network data and geolocations, are available for further research. Ethical considerations were addressed through consultation with data protection officers and an ethics review board, ensuring compliance with data protection regulations. The dataset adheres to the FAIR principles, making it accessible and useful for future scholarly research on digital mobilization.Item Leaning in or turning away? Differential effects of the early pandemic lockdown on Twitter use(2024-09-28) Stoltenberg, Daniela; Kligler-Vilenchik, Neta; de Vries Kedem, Maya; Gur-Ze'ev, Hadas; Pfetsch, Barbara; Waldherr, AnnieThe COVID-19 pandemic raised interest in the question of digital participation and expression during crises. Our study contributes to this debate through a deep dive into differential effects the pandemic had on the social and political expression of Twitter users. We report results from a mobile experience sampling method survey of intense users from Jerusalem, Israel. As the study was in the field when lockdown measures were implemented, it can trace changes in expressive behaviors as the crisis emerged. Our data demonstrate differential patterns in use intensity and communication about the pandemic. Many people intensified their Twitter use, but some turned away. Compared with younger users, older people used Twitter less and communicated about the pandemic less. More educated users intensified their use, compared with less educated users. Rather than causing complete realignments of expression, the pandemic intensified existing differential patterns. Our study demonstrates how, in a moment of uncertainty, a situation-specific information elite formed within a set of intense Twitter users, one that could gain disproportionate power in shaping public understanding of the pandemic.Item Pandemic Populism? How Covid-19 Triggered Populist Facebook User Comments in Germany and Austria(2022-02-17) Thiele, DanielCovid-19 and the government measures taken to combat the pandemic have fueled populist protests in Germany and Austria. Social media played a key role in the emergence of these protests. This study argues that the topic of Covid-19 has triggered populist user comments on Facebook pages of German and Austrian mass media. Drawing on media psychology, this article theorizes populist comments as an expression of “reactance,” sparked by repeated “fear appeals” in posts about Covid-19. Several hypotheses are derived from this claim and tested on a dataset of N = 25,121 Facebook posts, posted between January 2020 and May 2021 on nine pages of German and Austrian mass media, and 1.4 million corresponding user comments. To measure content-based variables automatically, this study develops, validates, and applies dictionaries. The study finds that the topic of Covid-19 did trigger populist user comments and that this effect grew over time. Surprisingly, neither the stringency of government measures nor mentions of elitist actors were found to have the expected amplifying effect. The study discusses the findings against the background of governing the ongoing crisis and worrisome developments in the online public sphere.Item Chat groups as local civic infrastructure: A case study of “Solidary neighborhood help” Telegram groups during the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany(2025) Pasitselska, Olga; Bühling, Kilian; Gagrčin, EmilijaMessaging groups are emerging as “meso-spaces”—digital environments that enable sustained dialogue and collective action through their distinct affordances. We examine how such spaces facilitate civic self-organization through their hybrid online/offline, public/private, and local/global dynamics and how they function as local civic infrastructure during times of crisis. Using a mixed-methods analytical approach, we examined 47 public Telegram groups from Germany during the COVID-19 pandemic. We identified a fundamental tension between political discussion and practical help in these spaces, resolvable through active horizontal participation (including norm negotiation and self-moderation), or strict vertical moderation. Additional challenges included a lack of access to vulnerable groups and limited outreach to local civil society actors, both of which hindered group activity and structural connections within local civic infrastructure. Despite these challenges, our study highlights the potential of local chat groups for self-organization, albeit primarily among privileged urban individuals. We discuss the implications for democratic theory and practice.Item Radicalization or relief: Divergent impacts of the COVID-19 lockdown on incels by seniority(SAGE Publications, 2025) Wedel, Lion; Coufal, LindaIncels (involuntary celibates) base their identity on the inability to form romantic relationships. We conceptualize the ideology promoted by incels as misogynist extremism and explore the impact of the first COVID-19 lockdown on the radicalization of this online community. Based on computational measures, we conducted a multi-perspective exploration, comparing the prevalence of and participation in threads dealing with extremism, ideology and mental health on the incels.is forum between pre-lockdown, lockdown and post-lockdown periods. We found evidence of long-term and temporary radicalization. Moreover, we found that, specifically, older forum members increasingly post in extremist-themed threads triggered by the lockdowns. Crucially, we show that activity on mental health–themed threads temporarily decreased during the lockdown. These findings indicate that real-world social isolation reduces mental health complaints among incels but, at the same time, exacerbates misogynist extremism among active community members.Item Auswirkungen von Covid-19 auf arbeitsvermittelnde Plattformen und Ressourcen der Pandemiebewältigung(2023) Gerber, Christine; Wandjo, DavidDer Artikel untersucht die Auswirkungen der Covid-19-Pandemie auf arbeitsvermittelnde Plattformunternehmen sowie deren Strategien der Krisenbewältigung. Auf Grundlage einer qualitativen Untersuchung von zehn Unternehmen, die ortsabhängige und/oder ortsunabhängige Plattformarbeit in Deutschland organisieren, werden die Gruppen der Krisengewinner und Krisenbewältiger identifiziert. Die Befunde zeigen, dass zentrale Bewältigungsstrategien vor allem die Anpassung der angebotenen Dienstleistungen und die Erschließung neuer Kund*innen, teilweise sogar die Anpassung des Geschäftsmodells, sowie die Optimierungen von Service-Abläufen waren. Zentrale Resilienzressourcen sind insbesondere skalier- und diversifizierbare Ökosysteme, das Asset-light-Modell und damit einhergehend geringe Fixkosten sowie eine hohe Risikoauslagerung. Der Artikel trägt zu den Debatten um das mögliche Ausbreitungspotenzial des Geschäftsmodells in der Pandemie sowie um die Anpassungsfähigkeit von arbeitsvermittelnden Plattformunternehmen an externe, gesellschaftliche Veränderungen bei.Item How COVID-19 and the News Shaped Populism in Facebook Comments in Seven European Countries: A Computational Analysis.(2024) Thiele, DanielCitizen-generated populism is flourishing in the comments sections of online news. The factors that shape the extent of such populist communication from below are still under-researched. This study focuses on the COVID-19 crisis to examine how contextual and media-related factors are related to the extent of populism in comment sections on Facebook pages of news outlets from seven European countries (AT, DE, FR, IT, NL, SE and UK). Computational text analysis, machine translation and Bayesian multilevel regression were used to analyze digital trace data from 65,258 posts and 3.4 million comments published between February 2020 and June 2021. The computational measurements - multilingual dictionaries for posts and distributed dictionary representation to capture populism in comments - were rigorously validated. The results show that posts referring to the government, experts, COVID-19, and restrictions exhibit higher levels of populism in the comments sections. The stringency of containment policies was positively associated with populism in Germany, Austria, and the Netherlands when COVID-19 was mentioned. Lower levels of populism were observed for tabloid media and when news outlets engaged in visible moderation. The implications of these findings beyond the pandemic context and methodological challenges are discussed.Item Avoiding the news to participate in society? The longitudinal relationship between news avoidance and civic engagement(2022) Ohme, Jakob; de Bruin, Kiki; de Haan, Yael; Kruikemeier, Sanne; Van Der Meer, Toni G. L. A.; Vliegenthart, RensLower levels of news use are generally understood to be associated with less political engagement among citizens. But while some people simply have a low preference for news, others avoid the news intentionally. So far little is known about the relationship between active news avoidance and civic engagement in society, a void this study has set out to fill. Based on a four-wave general population panel survey in the Netherlands, conducted between April and July 2020 (N = 1,084) during a crisis situation, this research-in-brief investigates the development of news avoidance and pro-social civic engagement over time. Results suggest that higher news topic avoidance results in higher levels of civic engagement. The study discusses different explanations for why less news can mean more engagement.Item Tweeting in the Time of Coronavirus: How Social Media Use and Academic Research Evolve during Times of Global Uncertainty(2020) Kligler-Vilenchik, Neta; Stoltenberg, Daniela; de Vries Kedem, Maya; Gur-Ze’ev, Hadas; Waldherr, Annie; Pfetsch, BarbaraOur international research team was in the midst of a comparative study about the day-to-day experience of Twitter users in Berlin and Jerusalem through a series of daily short surveys, when our Jerusalem data were becoming increasingly “compromised” by the growing public concern, and tightening government measures, around the spread of the Coronavirus in Israel. During the two waves of our 10-day survey of salient Twitter users in Jerusalem (March 9–March 19, N = 34; March 23–April 2, N = 25), Israel shifted from 50 confirmed Coronavirus cases to over 6,800 and from relative routine to almost full stay-at-home orders. This essay presents two intersecting narratives. First, we consider the methodological challenges of adapting ongoing academic survey studies to changing conditions. We then offer a mixed-methods analysis of the experiences of our Twitter users and how they saw the Coronavirus crisis shaping their use of Twitter. The essay thus offers a unique methodological and empirical vantage point on how social media use—and academic research—evolve during times of global uncertainty.Item COVID-19 as a Jump Start for Industry 4.0? Motivations and Core Areas of Pandemic-Related Investments in Digital Technologies at German Firms(2023) Butollo, Florian; Flemming, Jana; Gerber, Christine; Krzywdzinski, Martin; Wandjo, David; Delicat, Nina; Herzog, LorenaAcademic studies prior to the pandemic rather emphasized that the progression towards Industry 4.0 happened in an incremental manner. However, the extraordinary circumstances of the pandemic have led to considerable investments that were widely interpreted as a (generalized) digitalization push. However, little is known about the character of such investments and their effects. The goal of this contribution is to provide an empirically based overview of recent investment in digital technologies in six economic sectors of the German economy: mechanical engineering, chemicals, automotives, logistics, healthcare, and financial services. Based on 36 case studies and a survey at 540 companies, we investigate the following questions: 1. How much did the COVID-19 pandemic reduce existing obstacles for investments in digitalization measures? 2. Is there a universal digitalization push due to the COVID-19 pandemic that differs from the trajectory before the pandemic? The results show that the pandemic affected investment in an unequal manner. It was driven by the immediate need to sustain business operations through the virtualization of communication among employees and with external partners. However, there was less dynamism in shop-floor-related digitalization, as it was less related to epidemiological concerns and is more long-term in nature.